I Crave the Darkness
by Wine-into-Water
Summary: A stand alone, From Bosco's POV. He comes to terms with his new life. Set after Monsters.


**I Crave the Darkness**  
  
**A Stand Alone **

**Disclaimer**: Third Watch and all it's characters belong to NBC, WB, John Wells and company. I only borrow.  
  
**Summery**: Bosco comes to terms with his new life. Mainly a Bosco fic with Bosco/Faith undertones. Set after Monsters but without knowing what will happen in More Monsters.  
  
**Rating**: PG 13 (for a few choice words)  
  
**Authors Note**: I know I'm the last one who should be writing new fics but when an idea hits, why not ï A big special thanks goes to Helena for being my encouraging sounding board and to my extremely wonderful beta who with out her I would be a complete mess. Thanks for all your help!!  
  
**Feedback**: It may have been awhile but nothing has changed. I crave it.  
  
&&&&&&&

Darkness.

Darkness is my greatest fear.

I'm...

I am a grown man, a cop, one of NY's finest. I've seen things most people couldn't begin to imagine much less see what I see. I've taken down drug dealers and killers, yet it's something so simple and common as darkness that cripples me. A fear stemmed from a childhood routine of beatings and punishment that included nights locked in a closet no light, no air, and no sound except for the whimpers that came out of my own mouth. So even now, yearss later darkness closes in on me, suffocating me until my chest aches and sweat begins to form. My heart pumps widely trying to accommodate for the lack of oxygen. I pray for light to soon find me, to release me from the hell I find myself in, to take away the crippling panic so I can once again begin to breathe.

Darkness is truly my hell, an enemy I will never defeat, and still I lay here longing for it, craving it because now it's the lesser of two evils.  
  
I'm trapped. I feel like I no longer exist. It seems like it has been a million years since it all began. Each minute drags on, seeming like hours but according to what they tell me it's only been a month. If it has only been a month, how am I ever going to endure a lifetime of this? I want nothing more to scream that they are all wrong; that it is impossible because it has to have been years and years since they've been able to hear me but I can't tell them anything. I can only lay here trapped in this damn body that no longer works. I watch as they come in one by one, different people on different days. Some looking at me with pity, their eyes telling me _oh how the mighty have fallen_. They speak to me as if I was a child, mourning me, believing I'm gone, that the only thing that remains of me is my body. My mind is no longer capable of forming any thought and ability to function. They are wrong damn it!! I'm in here!  
  
Then there are the ones who come here out of a sense of obligation like Cruz, Jimmy and Dad to name a few, but the list does go on. They only come to prove they care to make themselves look good in front of the ones that do care about me. They are uncomfortable and wish they were anywhere else but here, good for them I say. They want to come in here and make me feel like shit. Staring into their blank faces seeing very well that they could care less one way or the other what happened to me. Fuck them.

I often wonder which I hate the most, the sympathy or the obligatory visits. Both make me feel worthless they send me to a place that makes me long for the darkness. At least with the obligation visits they are quick, and I know they mean nothing...I've come to the decision. I hate them all! Sully, Ma, Ty, Monroe, Dad, Cruz, and even the damn doctors. Damn them, flaunting in front of me a life and abilities I can never have again.

I never want to see any of them again. Why can't they stay away and leave me alone? They didn't seem to care all that much before I ended up here so why bother now?  
  
"Hey Bos, how are you today?"  
  
So much for taking a nap and hoping to get trapped in the darkness again; I should have known. Every time I wish for darkness, she comes and makes me rethink things. I wish I could hate her, lump her in with everybody else who parades in and out of here, but I can't. She's different. She's always been different.  
  
"I know you're not big on flowers, Bos, but this room needs some brightening up." My eyes follow her as she sets down a small bouquet of yellow flowers and walks over to the window and opens the shades. Light begins to filter in. She turns to me and smiles, "That's better." She walks back and takes her usual seat on the chair beside my bed and picks up my hand to hold it in hers. I can feel the warmth of her hand penetrate mine. She squeezes my hand, I try to return it but my hands no longer do what I want them to.  
  
She begins to talk about everything and nothing, but not in a nervous way like the others who drop by. She talks because she knows I can hear her. I can understand every word that comes out of her mouth. That I don't mind her ramblings and her stories, that I enjoy listening to them. There is one subject she never touches on though, not once since I was trapped in the darkness has she mentioned it. She probably thought I couldn't hear her, but I did.  
  
Even in the darkness, I knew immediately when she entered the room. How you ask? Chalk it up to being partners for so long. Maybe it's because beyond our partnership we were once the closest of friends whether either of us cared to admit it or not. So, yeah, I knew it was her before she sat down, grabbed my hand and began to cry. At that moment I wanted nothing more then to reach out to her and touch her, comfort her and tell her that there was no reason to cry because I was going to be just fine, but that was when I was only trapped by darkness. I never imagined that when the light finally came, when I was finally able to wake up. I'd still be locked inside. Maybe she did.  
  
Like I said before, I don't really have a sense of time anymore, but she stayed awhile that night, crying, saying she was sorry, and calling me a fool for trying to protect her. Like I really had a choice? She's Faith, my partner and my friend. She's my Faith. I'd do it a million times over with the out come always the same if it meant keeping her safe.  
  
Now don't go putting words in my mouth. I don't want this. Let me make that perfectly clear. I hate what has become of me. I want to cry, shout, scream, and fight. Let God or the fates or whatever higher power there is suppose to be out there know that this sucks! This isn't fair. I don't deserve this. Of all the crap I've already been through in my life, of all the shit I have pulled in my life this is a punishment no short of pure torture. In the same breath I want to beg, plead and bargain with the higher power I just damned to give me my life back. Make me the man I once was, give me control again, let this all be a nightmare and let me wake up. My bargaining chip is everything. I'd trade anything for my chance at my life again. Everything but one thing, and she is sitting beside me telling me how Charlie was named MVP of his soccer league. So I guess we've come full circle haven't we? The one thing I won't give up is the reason I'm here. So let the higher power give me my chance. Give me that day again but I'll always end it the same. I would see the gunmen; hear the shattering of the glass. I'd leap for her, pushing her to the ground but before I feel us hit the cool tiled floor, I'd wake up in the darkness trapped in what I hear is a coma pushing the crippling fear aside. Praying she was safe this time.  
  
People will think I'm an idiot. She does, I can see it in her eyes, but in the million years that I've been laying here I've come to realize, I am in hell. Years of wanting nothing more, trying only for one thing to have complete and utter control of my life and now I haven't got any, my life is just out of reach and unlike the movies or storybooks I can't rewrite this ending and make it any better. But yet somehow she does make it better. She repays me every single day and for that I am eternally grateful. She still sees me, accepts me for who I am. She can see past the bandages and scars, ignores the body that moves with out any control of my own, past the saliva that leaks from the corner of my mouth, and when I open my mouth when the words I intend to speak come out only as sounds she understands me. She focuses on my eyes; she can see what nobody else has bothered to look for. She can see me, she knows I'm still here able to hear her and understand her. I'm just trapped in a body that no longer works for me. She knows this because we've always been able to talk without saying a word. We just have to look at each other and we know.  
  
If I feel this way if I think her understanding me is a great gift then why do I crave for darkness? Because, like I said before, it's the lesser of two evils.  
  
In the darkness, I'm still stuck in myself not being able to get out. I still feel humiliated by what I've become. I can still hear her and I can still feel her touch the only thing that changes is I can't see her, I can't look into her eyes and read what she doesn't say. It's what I can see that brings me my greatest pain. She tries to hide it from me knowing I can still read her like she reads me but when I first came out of the darkness before she saw I was still here she didn't try to hide it. Didn't know she had to. I can't tell you when she realized it because I hadn't seen it before, but I'm assuming it was when I was hurt, the same way I did last year when I saw her lying on Noble's floor surrounded by her own blood. She loves me. We love each other.  
  
So that is why I crave the darkness because again this final realization is just the last laugh on the big cruel joke that has become my life. My greatest gift is also a curse. She's the only person who knows I'm still here, but I look at her and see that she loves me. I see the life we were never meant to have together. A house, a white picket fence, Emmy, Charlie, a baby, and a dog named Boo. All of it could have been mine but no longer can be. There is no return from where I am now. It's impossible. I'm forever trapped. So what is worse? A crippling fear that in time I'd get use to it or knowing a life I've always wanted was just in reach then taken from me. My answer is always the same...I crave the darkness.


End file.
